Guardiola: Offer he could refuse - easily

Pep Guardiola was never going to be lured by lucre, and that's a good lesson learnt by the Chelsea owner. The former Barca boss has always been a top class manager and would never get himself into a position of humiliation such as that suffered by Scolari, Ancelotti, Villas-Boas and Di Matteo. The scales seem to be increasingly tilting against Rafael Benitez, and when the inevitable happens to him, Guardiola's decision would be vindicated.

Bayern Munich is a historic club with a rich history of silverware, and is exactly the type of club that would suit Guardiola's understated but dynamic style very well. Manchester United also offers the kind of stability that Guardiola would have been searching for in a top football club, but with Sir Alex still not clear about when he's leaving and rumours of his old rival Mourinho being linked with Old Trafford, Guardiola steered clear of any controversy.

Pep Guardiola is a young manager; ambitious, respected and willing to cement his style of management on the psyche of football. He is also a new-breed of manager, newer than his fitting rival Jose Mourinho. However, given the money that Abramovich was offering him to seal the deal with Stamford Bridge, the remuneration was never so important for the Spaniard. This is where the Russian owner learnt a lesson or two.

Chelsea is a rich football club with a rich owner, with a name that's talked of in the same breath as Man United.Whether he would do well at Stamford Bridge, whether he would befittingly be the Chelsea manager with Mourinho taking over Manchester United, how would their old rivalry pan out; all of this will now only be a matter of theoretical interest and conjecture.